The Lone Ranger (2013)

The Lone Ranger Synopsis

From producer Jerry Bruckheimer and director Gore Verbinski, the filmmaking team behind the blockbuster Pirates of the Caribbean franchise, comes Disney/ Jerry Bruckheimer Films’ The Lone Ranger, a thrilling adventure infused with action and humor, in which the famed masked hero is brought to life through new eyes. Native American spirit warrior Tonto (Johnny Depp) recounts the untold tales that transformed John Reid (Armie Hammer), a man of the law, into a legend of justice—taking the audience on a runaway train of epic surprises and humorous friction as the two unlikely heroes must learn to work together and fight against greed and corruption.

Native American spirit warrior Tonto (Johnny Depp) and man of the law John Reid (Armie Hammer) are opposites brought together by fate and must join forces to battle greed and corruption.

Last year was a pretty fantastic one for movie music. Directors like David O. Russell, Wes Anderson, Quentin Tarantino and Ben Affleck made not only fantastic films, but also beautifully crafted soundtracks that blended perfectly with the story and visuals on screen. As a result, 2013 had a lot to live up to, but looking back on the last twelve months reveals that this year’s crop of filmmakers were more than up for the task.

I'll be recapping the highs and lows of the movie business experienced over the past 12 months. 2013 has been a pretty fascinating time for film, full of reversals of fortune, dizzying successes and even some truly polarizing pictures. So let's look back and GIF out!

Quentin Tarantino doesn't have a movie coming out this year, nor is he currently working on one, but that doesn't mean he won't do his damnedest to dominate the news anyway. Just after releasing his incredibly premature Top 10 list of the year, which included The Lone Ranger and Kick-Ass 2, he's given an interview to the French magazine Les Inrockuptibles in which he sounds off on Ben Affleck playing Batman. Strap in, everybody! It's time for some QT truth bombs

The Quentin Tarantino Archives has released a list of the esteemed director’s favorite films of the year so far. Personally, I was surprised by several of his picks, so I thought I’d test the rest of you to see if from the twenty films listed you can figure out which titles are really on his top ten.

According to The Wrap, as Disney reels from the estimated $150 million they lost on The Lone Ranger, they're tinkering with producer Jerry Bruckheimer's role on Pirates 5, talking about limiting the film's budget and, most shockingly, denying him final cut

"First and foremost, the media is targeting all these movies. There’s intense scrutiny on us, way more than before,” the actor said, eventually shifting some of the blame on the marketing efforts of major studios. “They are spending so much money to pull the wool over the audience’s eyes with these effects-driven movies.'

Depp, whose face alone has helped movies like The Tourist and Public Enemies make more than $200 million worldwide, is clearly lying through his teeth about not expecting The Lone Ranger to be a blockbuster-- he knew as well as anyone how much money Disney spent on the film, how hard they marketed it, and how much the film was engineered to appeal to as many audiences as possible.

Don't cry for Disney. Thanks to the wild success of their first three releases of 2013, they've become the first studio this year to gross a billion dollars at the domestic box office. And just think how much more they are making in merchandizing.

Analysts say that by the end of The Lone Ranger's run it will likely only manage to make $125 million domestically and $150 million overseas - for a total of only $275 million. It will likely be the second triple-digit loss for Disney in as many years, as the company had to deal with the $200 million loss of Andrew Stanton's John Carter in 2012.

Following the insane success of their Depp-fronted Pirates of the Caribbean franchise, Disney was expecting Johnny Depp to be the major draw. But with his seemingly second flop in two years, it appears Depp's star power is failing. And I say it's his own damn fault.

Jamaican-American comic book artist Keron Grant, best known for his work on Marvel issues, recently posted a series of concept drawings on his Tumblr account account that makes the prospect of a TV series seem not so far-fetched.

One of the first casting rumors to hit at the time placed acting newcomer Armie Hammer taking the role of Batman. Hammer has since gone on to make a name for himself with starring turns in The Social Network, J. Edgar and, most recently, the big screen adaptation of The Long Ranger

Animated sequel Despicable Me 2 stole the show this weekend following a highly successful early July 4th holiday opening. Gru and his wildly popular minion crew outdid themselves with an $82 million debut, well beyond the $56 million opening for the first movie back in 2010.

Johnny Depp as a Native American sidekick just isn’t selling tickets. The Lone Ranger is unlikely to make it even to $50 million as its final domestic total for the 5-day holiday weekend. Disney’s in trouble here because it wasn’t exactly cheap to make. Though Johnny Depp reportedly took a 20% pay cut to star, the film still cost around $215 million to get in the can.

Last month I had the chance to fly out to Santa Fe, New Mexico to take part in a press day for The Lone Ranger, and during my stay I had the terrific opportunity to sit down one-on-one with the star in the titular role. Check out our conversation below, where Hammer talks about tackling an iconic pop culture character, working with both director Gore Verbinski and Johnny Depp, and his surprise that we didn’t all just die out in the desert

Yes, it's only Wednesday, but with tomorrow being Independence Day and a whole lot of people considering this a holiday weekend (not that we're jealous or anything!), all of the weekend's biggest releases are already open, and the box office reports are rolling in. The two biggest films, The Lone Ranger and Despicable Me 2, ought to have no trouble with competing with each other.

At some point, walking into a theater lobby or clicking through some trailers online, you have definitely said to yourself: "Wait, they're remaking that?" It's a longstanding complaint that there are no new ideas in Hollywood, and getting upset about the amount of remakes and sequels is as useless as yelling about the heat in the summer.

Check out or conversation inside in which the director not only links the relationship between the Lone Ranger and Tonto to both Don Quixote and Midnight Run, but also talks about the importance of showing the truth of the Native American experience, his apprehension about taking on the project initially, and his hopes to do something small as his next film.

Standing at 6'5", Armie Hammer has more experience than most with heights. But standing that tall just means he was that much higher up while standing on a rickety platform balanced on a cliff while shooting The Lone Ranger.

It's been almost exactly ten years since the first Pirates of the Caribbean surprised the hell out of everyone by being pretty great, and it's easy to forget how genuinely wonderful that was. Johnny Depp was suddenly a mega-star, pirates were suddenly cool again, and Gore Verbinski proved that the right combination of action and humor could make even a theme park ride turn into a pretty great movie

Walt Disney Studios showed off a full 20 minutes of action-packed footage from Gore Verbinski’s The Lone Ranger, which, in addition to the recently-released trailer, makes the film look like it could be one of the biggest surprise hits of the summer season.

Though the early summer blockbusters like Star Trek Into Darkness and Iron Man 3 are stealing all the attention right now, it won't be long before we're gearing up for the July 4 holiday, and with it The Lone Ranger. The latest collaboration between Pirates of the Caribbean veterans Gore Verbinski and Johnny Depp, plus Armie Hammer tossed in to play the title role

Does this tell us anything about The Lone Ranger we didn't know already? Nah. Like Pirates of the Caribbean before it, this movie will succeed only if it manages to make something surprising, comic and hugely entertaining out of a very thin premise. Verbinski and Depp were justly celebrated for pulling ti off back in 2003

As expected, this clip continues to keep a strong focus on Tonto, primarily because he’s being played by international superstar (and frequent Verbinski collaborator) Johnny Depp. The early shots seem to establish Tonto’s backstory, with Armie Hammer’s Lone Ranger character eventually taking center stage.

Even though it's right there in the title, it might surprise you to learn that The Lone Ranger is not, in fact, entirely about Johnny Depp's character Tonto. Depp is a bigger star than the guy playing the actual Lone Ranger, Armie Hammer, so you can't really blame them for focusing more of the marketing on Tonto

There are probably people out there in the world-- millions of them, in fact-- who are looking forward to this Sunday as a chance to see two different groups of giant men crash into each other for the sake of catching and running with a weird-shaped ball. Then there's a much smaller group of us who just want to see which trailers will premiere

Everyone knows that the Super Bowl broadcast is one of the biggest advertising opportunities around, and that fact isn't lost on the major movie studios. Every year they shill out millions upon millions of dollars to take advantage of the incredible number of viewers watching. Last year brought previews for movies like The Avengers, 21 Jump Street, The Hunger Games, John Carter, and Battleship. But can we expect from this year's how?

Jack White does have some experience working in the movie industry. In addition to giving permission for his songs to be used in a variety of films (the most recent being David O. Russell's Silver Linings Playbook), he has even done a bit of acting (notably playing Elvis Presley in Walk Hard: The Dewey Cox Story and Georgia in Anthony Minghella's Cold Mountain.

The big budgeted action-adventure from Disney stars Armie Hammer as the titular masked man, and features Johnny Depp as his Native American sidekick Tonto. With a frenzied collision of grand set pieces, train robberies, and glimpses of the movie's buzzed about action sequences, the first trailer had plenty of panache but little in the way of plot. Now the feature's second trailer gives us an introduction to the premise of a man meant to become a legend. And there's even more action on display.

Headed into theaters next summer is The Lone Ranger, Gore Verbinski's take on the story of the Lone Ranger and his friend Tonto. Yesterday, we got a look at an intriguing looking teaser poster. Today comes the trailer for the film, which not only shows Armie Hammer's character in action, but also shows a lot of action.

The images and bits of footage we've seen from Gore Verbinski's The Lone Ranger so far have focused on an old-timey Western feel, making the action-adventure film look more like a John Ford classic than something from the guy who brought you Pirates of the Caribbean films

After approximately a billion years in production-- or, OK, maybe only about half a year-- Disney's massive The Lone Ranger has finally closed up shop, with the reunion between Pirates of the Caribbean director Gore Verbinski and star Johnny Depp set for release July 3 next year

The Lone Ranger has now been in production for at least 140 days. In June when we recounted many of the delays above had ballooned the film's budget back to the $250 million range, production was expected to wrap by the end of August .Now there are reports the principal photography portion of the shoot may at last draw to a close in September.

A crew member working on the set of The Lone Ranger has died while prepping a water tank, possibly cleaning it. After the initial reports of the death, officials have gone on record saying that the crew member might have suffered a heart attack while submerged underwater, and that they are treating the death as "natural."

With a tradition of pumping out sequel after sequel, DreamWorks Animation is often accused of valuing commerce over artistry in their films, especially when compared to Pixar. And the latest news out of Hollywood isn't likely to help that image as the studio behind Shrek Forever After and Madagascar 3 is in talks to buy a cache of Classic characters that include Casper the Friendly Ghost, Archie...

The Lone Ranger is much more about trains than you're probably imagining. Disney snuck a brief trailer for their upcoming, huge-budget action film at the very end of today's Hall H panel, and for about a solid minute the entire focus was on railroads-- the laborers who built them

You might think massively budgeted misfires like John Carter and Battleship would have filmmakers wary of expensive pictures that require record-breaking box office to garner any profit. But with ongoing news of costly production problems on World War Z and The Lone Ranger, it seems Hollywood is still rolling the dice on movies with fast sinking prospects of profitability

The Lone Ranger just can't seem to keep things on track. The project has had a notably bumpy ride through production so far, complete with production shut downs, budget queries, and adjustments to the shooting schedule. The movie was originally going to come on in December of this year and was pushed back to May 31, 2013. Now it looks like the film is on the move again, as it has been pushed back by about a month.

The more we learn about the upcoming Disney film The Lone Ranger, the more interesting the project seems to get. Just the other day, we shared some comments Johnny Depp made about the inspiration for the make-up he's wearing as Tonto. And today we learned some intriguing news on the subject of the film's score. The movie now has someone on board to do the score, and he could prove to bring a very interesting sound to the mix.

When the first image was released from The Lone Ranger after the movie had barely begun production, I think I speak for all of us when I say there was one thing on our minds: why does Johnny Depp have a bird on his damn head?

It looks like Depp is side-stepping the whole problem of being a white man playing a Native American by painting his face stark white with black stripes, making this feel more like the child of Edward Scissorhands and Captain Jack Sparrow on a trip to the Old West than anything resembling the old TV serial

Johnny Depp is the big name star of the film, reuniting with his Pirates director Gore Verbinski, but the title character is played by Armie Hammer, making a real push for leading-man stardom that will hopefully be boosted by his role in the upcoming Mirror Mirror

Gore Verbinski's The Lone Ranger lost a big piece of the puzzle a couple days ago when it was announced that Dwight Yoakam would no longer be able to participate in the film. While this wouldn't have been a big issue if Yoakam was playing a random supporting character or bit part, but he had signed on to play one of the major bad guys working with Tom Wilkinson's big baddie.

Deadline does say that Yoakam was set to play one of the major bad guys, which is interesting. Right now, Tom Wilkinson’s still on tap to play Latham Cole, the film’s chief villain. We weren’t sure who Yoakam was scheduled to play. Could there be room for more than one adversary in Ted Elliott and Terry Rossio’s screenplay? Or was Yoakam just set to play a major component of Cole’s villainous squad?

James Frain’s True Blood character Franklin Mott could probably be described as mentally unstable, to put it mildly. Sure, he came across as dark and alluring at first, as so many vampires do these days, but in the end, he proved to be as menacing as vampires were once more frequently portrayed, with a side of crazy for our entertainment. Since appearing in the HBO series, he’s gone on to take on a number of roles, including NBC’s short-lived superhero drama The Cape, and a part in Water For Elephants.

At this point many of you, if not most of you, know about the troubles going on behind the scenes of The Lone Ranger these past few months. Back in August the production was shut down when Disney decided that they didn't want to spend $250 million making a western (which is totally reasonable thing) and had producer Jerry Bruckheimer, director Gore Verbinski and star Johnny Depp work on the movie to try and lower its costs.

It's the Thor date shift that seems most striking to me-- you can launch a franchise whenever you want, but once you've got an ongoing property you generally want to keep it in the same time frame. And superhero movies, with very rare exceptions, have always been the province of summer

After being on the verge of destruction for over a month, Gore Verbinski's The Lone Ranger, starring Johnny Depp and Armie Hammer, is finally ready to saddle up and go. While the production was originally going to cost somewhere around $250 million - and include mystical elements like werewolves - executives at Disney made the filmmakers cut a large portion of the budget before letting the movie continue.

Of course, everyone said that pirate movies were hard to sell back in 2003, when director Gore Verbinski and Depp made one of the best blockbusters in recent memory with the first Pirates of the Caribbean. That movie was expensive at $140 million, but still not quite this expensive. Despite all this skepticism I really am glad they're going forward with The Lone Ranger